Peter Jackson
''"...the most important thing he has done is to be an influence and inspire literally a generation...probably two generations of filmmakers " —Peter Jackson referring to Ray Harryhausen in the film [[Ray Harryhausen: Special Effects Titan|''Ray Harryhausen: Special Effects Titan]] Sir Peter Jackson was a film director born in Zealand in 1961. Peter Jackson was featured in the film Ray Harryhausen: Special Effects Titan, documenting Ray Harryhausen's achivements. Jackson was well known is the film industry, and comented that Ray Harryhausen inspired him and the modern generation of film making. Jackson also created a remake of the popular 1933 film King Kong, the film that inspired Ray Harryhausen, in 2005. Film Career As a young child, Jackson grew up with Ray Harryhausen Films, and at age 16, created his first film, later titled Bad Taste. Over four years (from 1983 to 1987) Jackson's first feature, Bad Taste, grew in haphazard fashion from a short film into a 90-minute splatter comedy, with many of Jackson's friends acting and working on it for free. Shooting was normally done in the weekends since Jackson was now working full-time. Bad Taste is about aliens that come to earth with the intention of turning humans into food. Around this time Peter Jackson began working on writing a number of film scripts, in varied collaborative groupings with playwright Stephen Sinclair, Jackson's next film to see release was Meet the Feebles (1989), co-written by the four writers mentioned above. An ensemble musical comedy starring Muppet-style puppets, Feebles originally began as a short film intended for television, but was rapidly expanded into a full-length script after unexpected enthusiasm from Japanese investors, and the collapse of Braindead, six weeks before filming. Begun on a very low budget, Feebles went weeks over schedule. Jackson stated of his second feature length film, "It's got a quality of humour that alienates a lot of people.. It's very black, very satirical, very savage."9 Feebles marked Jackson's first collaboration with special effects team Richard Taylor (filmmaker)and Tania Rodger, who would later work on all Jackson's movies. From Lord of the Rings to King Kong Released in 1994 after Jackson won a race to bring the story to the screen, Heavenly Creatures marked a major change for Jackson in terms of both style and tone. Heavenly Creatures received considerable critical acclaim, including an Academy Award nomination for Best Original Screenplay and making top ten of the year lists in Time, The Guardian, The Sydney Morning Herald, and The New Zealand Herald. Durring the years 1999 to 2000, Jackson began production to a film epic, Lord of the Rings. King Kong Remake Around this time Jackson's remake of King Kong was shelved by Universal Studios, partly because Mighty Joe Young, another giant gorilla movie, had already gone into production. Universal Studios signed Peter Jackson for a second time to remake the 1933 classic King Kong (1933 film) — the film that inspired him to become a film director as a child.16 He was reportedly paid a fee of US$20 million upfront, the highest salary ever paid to a film director in advance of production, against a 20 percent take of the box-office rentals (the portion of the price of the ticket that goes to the film distributor, in this case Universal). The film was released on 14 December 2005, and grossed around US$550 million worldwide.﻿ ﻿ ﻿ ﻿ Category:Ray Harryhausen: Special Effects Titan Category:Humans